As an asset owner and manager

Swiss Life is an asset manager for its own insurance companies as well as for third-party clients such as pension funds, other insurance companies and private investors. As a responsible investor, Swiss Life can make a relevant contribution to the positive development of society and the environment. It does this by reducing risks to society and the environment, exploiting corresponding opportunities, and offering its customers appropriate investment products and solutions. The long-term protection of customer funds and the optimal allocation of risk capital are the main objectives. Invested assets must be secure, profitable, and liquid overall. Due to the long-term nature of its liabilities, Swiss Life invests predominantly in fixed-income securities such as government and corporate bonds as well as in real estate, equities and infrastructure. Its investment decisions have always been informed by a long-term assessment of risks and returns.

Swiss Life Asset Managers’ responsible investment approach encompasses all three dimensions of the ESG spectrum. In the context of TCFD reporting, a special focus is placed on climate-related and hence also environmental considerations. As an asset owner and manager, Swiss Life has various ways of exerting influence with varying degrees of impact on the investments made by it or on its behalf. This is taken into account when targets are set.

Swiss Life regularly procures climate indicators and climate-related projections – climate indicators such as from the independent providers MSCI ESG Research LLC, Bloomberg, Germanwatch and the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU), and projections in particular from the Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS). This involves using backward-looking metrics such as greenhouse gas emissions on the one hand and forward-looking metrics and projections from scenario analyses on the other hand. In order to more easily assess its understanding of climate-related risks, Swiss Life has been participating in the Paris Agreement Capital Transition Assessment (PACTA) since 2017. This assessment is carried out by the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN) and by the State Secretariat for International Finance (SIF). Swiss Life is gradually continuing the integration of the climate scenario metrics and the further application of various transition scenarios.